Hannah's heart: Adversity did not deter Coe-Brown ace runner from doing her part

By Mike Whaley

mwhaley@fosters.com

Friday, January 11, 2013

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Coe-Brown’s Hannah Parker has been named Foster’s girls cross country runner of the year for the second straight season. Parker led the Bears to their third straight D-II title, second consecutive Meet of Champions crown and a second-place finish at the New England championships.

NORTHWOOD — One is left to wonder what kind of cross country season Hannah Parker would have had in 2012 had she been healthy.

The Coe-Brown Northwood Academy sophomore battled a stomach virus most of the season, and yet still played a vital role in leading the Bears to a third straight Division II title, second consecutive Meet of Champions crown and second at the New England championships — the best cross country season in school history.

Coe-Brown was also fourth at the Nike Cross Northeast regional in Wappingers Falls, N.Y.

Parker, who won the school’s first D-II individual championship in late October, has been named Foster’s girls cross country runner of the year for the second straight time.

“That girl, I have just been in awe of her ability to compete when she’s not at her best,” said co-coach Brent Tkaczyk. “She somehow has the ability to regroup, no matter what and finish stronger than the people around her. It’s a pretty special thing that she has.”

Parker won the D-II race at Derryfield Park in Manchester, highlighting a dominating team performance by the Bears in which they scored 25 points to 97 for second-place Hanover.

“At the top of the hill, I knew she was going to do it,” said co-coach Tim Cox. “She had that look. It was a mile and a half in and she wasn’t going to be denied, no matter how fast she had to run that day.”

That race on that day solidified in her coaches’ minds the runner of the year award. Her efforts that followed also played a role in why they thought she deserved the award, although for different reasons.

If Parker was not at 100 percent in Manchester, she was even less so the following Saturday at the MOC in Nashua.

“I felt like it was all a haze,” Parker said. “I was kind of out of it. My legs just weren’t working anymore. All I thought was I need to finish this race. I couldn’t drop out. I just had to finish the race. That was my goal.”

Parker said freshman teammate Elisabeth Danis, who ran fourth in the MOC, played in integral role in helping her to finish.

“She was with me the whole first mile,” Parker said. “She really helped me through it and I really appreciated it. That’s one of the main parts of the team that I love because we’re all together as one.”

Parker finished a pedestrian 13th at the MOC, where again Coe-Brown won in convincing fashion with 66 points to 109 for second-place Londonderry.

“The Meet of Champions was survival,” Tkaczyk said. “She had no choice. We weren’t going to run the race at full tilt.”

Parker still wasn’t herself, so she went to a doctor and found she had bacteria in her stomach.

“It made my stomach feel so awful when I ran,” Parker said. “I didn’t feel it during the race, but after the race I felt ill.”

Now that what was wrong with her had been pinpointed, Parker breathed a little easier as she took antibiotics to battle the bacteria.

“It was definitely discouraging,” Parker said of the whole stomach virus affair. “But I knew the girls on my team were great runners and even though I worried about how I was feeling and they worried about how I was feeling, I knew they would give it their all, too.”

Indeed, Parker’s teammates had her back. There were the three freshmen (Danis, Laskowsky and Meg Scannell), classmate Katie Scannell, junior Jessie Carney and senior Katelyn Terry.

Parker was starting to feel better, but her coaches knew she still would not be at 100 percent for the New Englands at a wet and muddy course in Cumberland, Maine. There certainly was no way she could run at the pace she was accustomed to.

“New Englands was one of her most heroic efforts,” Cox said. “Brent and I are sitting there thinking should we even run her. Once we got the diagnosis we felt good about running her. We just had to be careful with hydration.”

So Cox and Tkaczyk devised a strategy that used Parker as the No. 3 runner to pull the fourth and fifth runners with her, while Danis and Laskowsky went out as the top two runners.

The strategy became even more complex when the Bears were given a poor box or lane position.

“She is the tallest kid on the team, so we had her block and plow through to get the little freshman out (at the start),” Cox said. “And then to come off that and run as third girl. Believe it or not, that’s an intricate race plan for a race of that level. For her to pull that off to perfection and feel good when she finished, that was a great moment.”

Parker was 43rd overall, while Danis was 17th and Laskowsky was 37th. CBNA was a solid second to Barrington, R.I., 75 to 132.

Cox added, “Without her we’re not second. We’re fourth, fifth or sixth and our season is probably over and we don’t go to the Nike regional where we had a great experience.”

Parker admitted she felt pretty good.

“I liked the course,” she said. “There was a lot of mud, but it was the first race I actually felt normal, since the beginning of the season. I was really happy that I ran the best that I could and I was feeling really great, too.”

She added with a laugh, “I was standing up at the end.”

Cox and Tkaczyk both agree that Parker has evolved in the team’s emotional leader.

“She’s the emotional pulse of the team,” Cox added. “She just wants to compete and that’s really refreshing.”